ZywOo: "We're trying to not think about the Grand Slam
Vitality are just two games away from winning an ESL Grand Slam. The French organisation have been in incredible form in 2025, winning three out four events they've attended so far this year.
With the chance to wrap up the Grand Slam in Melbourne, the team will now be pitted against The MongolZ, who came back from a map down to beat Liquid after a tense deciding map on Inferno.
Ahead of Vitality's semi-final against the Mongolian team and their trip to Copenhagen for BLAST Rivals, we sat down with their star man, ZywOo, to discuss ropz, his own ego, and what winning a Grand Slam would mean.
"Even at 80% of our game we will win"
It's been a great start to the year for Vitality, how are you feeling?
I feel good, it's been a really good start winning three tournaments. I don't think we expected to do it instantly when ropz joined the team, but obviously we put the effort in and it's working out.
We just want to forget 2024 and make this year really great. We have a great mood in the team now and we just want to keep it up.
You said that you didn't expect to be successful straight away with ropz then, but this is now the second time ropz has joined a team and had instant success. Is there something about his playstyle or personality that makes it easy to do so?
He brings so much to the team in terms of work ethic and experience. When he joined, the rest of us got a boost just following him.
I don't know if he had aura or something, but since he joined we're just playing really good CS together. We just need to follow him and the work he puts in, apEX likes it to have someone who works like him, and the rest of us are trying to follow in those steps.
Sometimes in practice you can be doing something else, but you see him on the server and you just want to join him to see what he's doing. It's really good to have him here.
Photo: Stephanie LindgrenWould you say the two of you also have a really good natural chemistry in game?
Yeah, of course. Whenever you play with someone with this amount of experience who is also a bit robotic in the way they think and peek, they'll never change their mind on how they do things so it's really easy to know what he's going to do, how he'll play, the way he'll use grenades.
Even in clutches or just the way he's going to lurk, we know what he's going to do before it happens so it's easy to see how the round will play out.
In terms of yourself, you spoke about wanting to forget 2024 and you've always downplayed yourself and the idea of being a superstar. Given that you've had such an incredible start to the year, did you need more of an ego to get back on top? Is that something you've added to your game?
Yeah, it's kinda ego, but it's also just having a good team around you. I've played more deathmatch and FACEIT, but I haven't changed by game. It's just that when you're confident in your team like I am, I know that I can die and trust the people behind me to win the round anyway.
Not being scared of doing anything on a server can bring you so much in terms of confidence, that's why I'm playing better this year. ropz is bringing a lot, but also having mezii, flameZ, and apEX having sick years in terms of levels and energy makes it so much easier.
When you feel like everyone is playing good, you can just play your own game and not feel like you have to do extra things in order to win a round.
As you said, everyone is having a really good start to the year and people are starting to talk about the gap between Vitality and the other teams. When you're on the server, does it feel like there is a gap at the moment?
Yes and no, we know that if we play really good CS then we have a good gap, but at the same time, we don't have to take some risks because even at 80% of our game we will win.
It's hard to say, but we know that if we play our A game we will destroy everyone in front of us. But, we know that everyone is watching us. We play a lot and it's tough to always find new things, especially when we play the same teams a lot. So, we have to be good individually, too.
There's a lot of teams trying to strengthen at the moment with Liquid bringing in siuhy and Falcons signing m0NESY, do you feel like it could be a different organisation other than Spirit and MOUZ that closes the gap to Vitality first?
It's tough to say, Falcons changed a lot and it didn't work out, but maybe with m0NESY and maybe kyousuke it could be great. But, how can you know when they haven't even played once together.
Liquid, it's also tough, they went into PGL Bucharest with less than a week of practice, so it's really tough to say who will be the next team to come up in tier one or in the top five. It's just too early for these teams.
Photo: Stephanie LindgrenYou're playing in IEM Melbourne, how's it going over there?
Obviously, the first thing is to win the tournament, or at least go really far in it. But we're trying to not think about the ESL Grand Slam, it can bring a lot of pressure if we do and we know that FaZe tried many times to win it last time.
We're going to talk about it, but it's not going to be the main thing we're thinking about. Everyone will watching us and it's going to be hard, we're not in the honeymoon anymore and we need to bring back the fire again. We have to keep grinding.
You said you're not going to think about it but given that you have the Katowice, the Cologne, the Major, how much would winning the Grand Slam mean?
For me it's less than Cologne and Katowice, there's less prestige. But it's something big still, not many teams have won it. It's only Astralis, Liquid, NAVI, and FaZe.
It's a nice thing to have in your career, but for me, it's not a big thing. I prefer to win tournaments in Cologne, Katowice, or Majors than the Grand Slam just for the prestige of it.
You brought up the Major there, it's only a couple of months away now, is there any concern that you might burn out or other teams will catch up by then?
Maybe, but I think we just need to keep the fire burning. People can grind really fast and keep the level up really high, so we just need to stay in our bubble and keep grinding and doing our thing.
We can't lose confidence if we lose one map or one game, we know we have the potential, so even though we could be going into the Major without the best confidence, we know we have a team where everyone can perform and shine.
The Major is different pressure, though, so if we go in as the top team it could be stressful, but we just need to not think about it and focus on our game. We just need to focus on that.
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